


The Demands Upon Royalty

by Felle



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Age Difference, F/M, Love Confessions, Post-Fire Emblem Fates: Birthright
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-29
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-12-26 03:55:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18275267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Felle/pseuds/Felle
Summary: Ryoma is nagging at Corrin to just pick a suitor already and get married. Corrin already made her choice some time ago, at least in her mind; but the king’s adviser may not be so easily within her grasp…at first.





	The Demands Upon Royalty

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is assuming the canonicity of the Birthright path. There’s some art about 75% of the way through that rides the line between SFW and NSFW like a mechanical bull, so please be aware of who may be looking at your screen. All that said, I hope you enjoy the story.

Corrin sighed, resting her chin on her hand, as she perused the profiles of suitors Ryoma had brought for her. Winning a war with nothing but a team of specialists and saving Hoshido seemed to count for very little against a king’s demand. She brushed one scroll aside to read the next without comment, prompting her brother to cock his head. “What was wrong with that one?” Ryoma asked.

“Nothing, really,” Corrin said idly. There had been no issues in what she read, and the sketch to go along with it was handsome enough, but it sparked the same feeling as looking at a cherry tree sapling: nice to look at, but unable to stir anything deeper. It was the same for the next scroll, and the next.

The king of Hoshido pinched the bridge of his nose. “We can’t keep having this conversation.”

“His Majesty would do well to remember that I have never been the one to _start_ any of these conversations. Not having it would be as simple as not beginning it, my king.”

“Corrin…”

She got away with quite a lot, all told. Ryoma wouldn’t have tolerated backtalk from any of his other siblings, not outside of the royal apartments. The perks of being a war hero, she thought. Corrin would have happily traded the privilege to keep from circling back to this issue every few months. Her retainers hovered near the side of the room, attentive to her frustration but powerless to allay it when the king was the cause. “Truly, I don’t see the need for this, Brother. The succession is secure. You and Kagero have your children, and so do Hinoka and Takumi. They’ve won you your alliances among the nobility. I don’t even want the throne, I’d pass it over if it came to that.”

“If I might interject?” Yukimura said from Ryoma’s side of the table.

Corrin straightened up and smiled at him. Her string of would-be suitors may not have stirred anything in her, but Yukimura…her smile faded a little. He was out of her reach, firmly in his role as Ryoma’s advisor. She could almost hear the string of arguments to shoot down her desire: he brought no alliance, his house consisted entirely of him, and he was almost twice her age besides. Though that last matter was hardly a point against him, in her estimation. No matter how she might have wanted to, there was little chance of her pushing him into anything else.

Not that she couldn’t enjoy what little scraps she could scrounge up. “Of course, Yukimura,” Corrin said sweetly.

“Even if not to bolster the royal family’s alliances among the daimyo, there is a certain…image to present to the people.” He pushed some loose hair behind his ear, knocking his glasses askew and forcing him to fix them before going on. Corrin sighed. “The rest of the royal family are envoys of the sovereign’s will. Leaving the question of Your Highness’s marital status unanswered can provoke _that_ as the topic of discussion, regardless of what else you might be trying to convey at the time.”

Corrin wasn’t going to pout in the absence of a counterargument, but that didn’t mean she was completely helpless. “I thought you were going to say that most of the Hoshidan people still look at me as an outsider and marrying into a noble house is the only way to show how I’ve severed my ties with Nohr.”

The way he blushed was so endearing, Corrin thought, with all the redness starting at the collar of his kimono and working its way up his neck before setting in his cheeks and ears. Her fingers fretted in her sleeves. “Your Highness’s record of action in the war is far above reproach,” Yukimura said. “If anyone in the realm believes that you haven’t thoroughly separated yourself from King Leo, then their ignorance is either willful or malicious.”

“You’re so kind to say so.”

His blush deepened.

“In any event, Sister, _that_ is the need for this. I’m sure that with a bit more effort on your part, you’ll be able to find a suitable match.”

“That must be easy for you to say,” Corrin muttered. She had been the one nudging him and Kagero together during the war when she saw what a good match they would make. Where she had acted with careful, subtle precision, Ryoma was doing little more than blindly shooting arrows and hoping that one would hit the mark with her. She grinned a little at her comparison, given how middling he was with the yumi.

“Now please compose yourself, you have a few young men to meet this afternoon,” Ryoma said, standing and frowning at the obvious distaste written on Corrin’s face. His expression softened. “I don’t like revisiting this any more than you do. Please, just pick someone. You really don’t have to see them outside of formal events, if that’s what you want.”

He whispered something to Yukimura, who stayed behind as the king strode out. Saizo stepped out of the shadows to follow him, leaving Corrin to wonder when he had even come in. “Did he tell you to stay behind so I wouldn’t do something impolitic?” Corrin asked.

Yukimura rubbed the back of his neck. “His Majesty…didn’t phrase it in quite that way.”

“Well, I won’t turn into a dragon or anything.” She touched the pendant under her kimono that held her old dragonstone. She _could_ , but there was no chance she would if she might hurt him in the process. “All right, let’s get this over with.”

Kaze melted into a shadow while Silas left to retrieve whoever was waiting. “I’ll make some tea,” Yukimura said, and busied himself over the brazier nearby. “The king means well, Your Highness.”

“I know. I only wish he wasn’t so insistent about it.”

He set her preferred teapot over the hot coals and prepared two cups. “I know that the nobility doesn’t marry for love, like most people do,” Yukimura said, still with his back to her. “My marriage was arranged as well, so I’m not unfamiliar with Your Highness’s trepidation.”

“You’re married?” Corrin asked, blurting it out before she could measure her response. Something tight and hot squeezed around her heart. Yukimura shook his head.

“I _was_ married, when I was younger than you are now. My parents had arranged it before they died. My wife was also the last member of a minor noble house, and…we got along well. I suppose we were more fortunate than some others in that regard. But a sickness tore through the region where we lived, and she…well. Her constitution was never the strongest.”

“I’m sorry,” Corrin said softly.

Yukimura finished setting the tea leaves in their cups and turned back to her. “It’s quite all right, Your Highness. It was a long time ago. And my work serving the throne is more than fulfilling enough for me.”

Still, there looked to be some sadness behind his spectacles. He shook it off quickly enough when Silas slid the door open and motioned to them. Corrin stood to receive her first suitor. _Let’s get this over with_.

She had no desire to put Yukimura in a difficult position by being a boor to her visitors, but neither could she bring herself to pretend she was enchanted with any of the young men who Silas showed into her offices. Hoshidan etiquette, thankfully, was a system of intricate subtleties, and most of the suitors were able to catch on to all of her little rejections. They knew they had wasted their time, but at least none of them were going to wait around, expecting to be called back.

“Is there some criteria counting against all of these men, Lady Corrin?” Yukimura asked, keeping the frustration he had to be feeling out of his voice. “Perhaps if we had more information, it would be easier to find someone more amenable to you.”

Corrin stared down at her newly empty teacup until Yukimura swept it away to brew her more, attentive as he was. Some criteria. _They’re not you_ , she wanted to say, but there was nothing down that road but heartbreak. And so much directness would be cause for reproach in Nohr, using it on a Hoshidan man might actually snap him in two. Something more roundabout, then.

“They all seem perfectly nice, but they’re so…young,” she said. The nape of her neck burned under her hair. “I think there was only one who was my age, and the rest were even younger than that. You’d think my brother raided a nursery.”

“Someone older, then?” Yukimura asked as he refilled her teacup. “That may be more difficult. Most of the Hoshidan nobility are married or betrothed by thirty.”

He was busy with steeping the leaves and mercifully unaware of her hungrily drinking in the sight of him. “Is that so,” she murmured. _There are always widowers_.

“I’ll make inquiries. Your tea, Lady Corrin.” He set two fresh cups on the table. “For now, there’s only one left today. You’ve been doing a good job so far, just try to deal with it for a little longer.”

“As you say.”

Her last ill-fated suitor held no more of her attention than the others had, at first. Corrin made her usual polite inquiries, asking after his family and their domain, but he kept tripping over his words and correcting himself as he shifted uncomfortably in his ill-fitting kimono. All told, he was very nervous, which made Corrin nervous. She shot a few glances toward Yukimura, standing a little ways back to observe, silently pleading with him to find some pretext that would cut this short. In the end, there was no space for him to intervene, and the interview dragged on to its torturous natural conclusion. Even with all the calming tea, her stomach was flipping with unease.

“Well, it was very good to meet you, please do enjoy all that Shirasagi has to offer while you’re here,” Corrin said evenly, then bowed. Something clicked in her mind, and she straightened up at once. “Your accent doesn’t sound like an islander.”

“My accent?” He sputtered over his words a bit more and stuffed his hands into his sleeves. Silas shifted in place near the door. “I—I don’t, ah, that is, I wasn’t educated in—”

“It sounds like what I remember of Windmire.”

All of the nervousness on his face melted away, replaced by hard lines and a harder gaze boring right into her. Corrin’s hands tightened into fists in her lap, and the little hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. “Die, traitor!”

There was a flash of steel from within his sleeve as he lunged over her table, but the flash was the only thing Corrin saw. Yukimura was on her all at once, keeping her tight against his chest with his back to her assassin. Her heart pounded in her chest, and her attempts to draw breath fell short against the crush of Yukimura around her. He backed her away until they were well clear of the table, then released her so he could turn around, still shielding her.

A thin ring around his left thumb was pulling taut a web of strings woven over the guest’s side of the table, binding her assailant in place as Kaze and Silas rushed him, weapons in hand. They barely glimmered in the light, visible only where they were pressing on skin or fabric. On the table was a long thin knife, small enough to conceal against a forearm but no less deadly for its size. Corrin was torn between holding on to Yukimura for support and clutching her chest to try and calm her heart. Thank the gods she had two hands.

“You didn’t notice he had the same accent as you?” Kaze asked through a snarl, leveling a dagger at the man’s throat. Silas made an irritated sound as he took a length of rope from Kaze’s belt and bound the assassin’s hands behind his back.

“He didn’t exactly say much around me!”

“Don’t kill him,” Yukimura said, his voice dropping to a growl. His breaths were little more than a hiss, and his hands were balled so tight that Corrin feared they might break under the strain. He relaxed his hold on his puppeteer’s strings enough for them to haul him out of it, holding tight on the back of his neck. “Not yet. Take him to Reina, and then make a sweep of the castle grounds. A thorough sweep.”

Nothing in his tone allowed for any argument. Kaze and Silas hauled him out, sweeping his legs so they were actually carrying him, and Yukimura only relaxed by some minute degree once the door was shut behind them. He flicked at the ring on his thumb and the strings all went slack, fluttering down onto the table as he turned around again and pulled Corrin against him. Her cheek pressed into the firm line of his collarbone, and his arms were a soothing pressure around her torso. Something in her lungs began working again, and her ragged breaths cut through the silence. “Are you all right, my lady?” Yukimura asked, closing protectively around her. “Dusk-drunk fanatics…”

She nodded against his chest. Whatever power was holding her legs up began to fail, and Corrin had to put her arms around Yukimura to keep herself upright. Tears welled in her eyes. This wasn’t how she wanted to be holding him. This was all wrong. He slowly let her go, his kimono marked with a few tearstains, and Corrin slumped down against the wall as he went back to the table to untangle the knife from his strings. It twirled and spun in his fingers to show every angle before stopping dead. “Blood?”

He was on her again within a breath, checking her clothes for tears before Corrin could say anything. Yukimura held up her right arm, all the color draining from his face when he saw the smear of red on the sleeve. Corrin’s whole body ran cold. “Yukimura, it’s not…it isn’t my blood,” she said.

They both looked down at his side, where the fabric of his dark green kimono was neatly cut and blotched with a growing red stain that seeped down toward his leg.

“Oh.”

Corrin stifled a cry while Yukimura pressed one hand over the wound and pulled her closer to keep her from seeing it. “It’s all right, you’re safe, that’s what matters,” he said, nestling her cheek into the crook of his shoulder. Corrin blinked away more tears. “You’re safe. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

⁂

Corrin thought she knew what Ryoma looked like when he was angry, but his cold, composed resolve during the war paled against his rage now. He prowled from one end of Corrin’s apartments to the other like a caged animal, hand closing and relaxing around Raijinto’s hilt all the while. No one wanted to speak before him, leaving everyone else unable to do anything but wait around uncomfortably until Kagero slipped into the room. Her royal regalia was gone, replaced by her old kunoichi outfit. Corrin’s shoulders lost some of their tension. The queen was the only person with a chance of resolving this without it descending into pointless shouting.

“We found the noble he was impersonating,” she said, and held out the crest of some minor house from the southeastern islands. “Stabbed to death and hidden along with his escort behind a storehouse on the outskirts.”

Ryoma took the crest and turned it over in his hand. “Two deaths and very nearly a third to show for all of this. This shouldn’t have happened. I’ve half a mind to march the army up to the border now that it has.”

“Brother, please,” Corrin said. Everyone turned to her as if they’d forgotten she was even there, or that they were in her apartments. Her heart thumped in her chest. For a matter revolving around her, she’d done little more than observe as everyone else reacted. “This wasn’t Leo’s doing. If anything, the assassin would get worse from him than whatever Reina is doing to him now.”

“I have to agree with the princess, Your Majesty,” Yukimura said. Corrin’s heart cracked a little at seeing him. He had changed his clothes after being healed, which hid the bandages that had to be underneath, but one arm still rested across his chest to keep his hand on his side. “King Leo made no secret of purging the more hawkish elements of the Nohrian government when he took the throne. It isn’t unreasonable to assume that some escaped his ire and managed to rally some soldiers who had their pride wounded by the war’s outcome. Reigniting those tensions would only bring more people to their cause.”

Ryoma pressed his lips into a thin line, searching for some kind of response that would allow him to vent his anger. Nothing seemed to come to him, and he was left to push a hand through his hair while Kagero went to his side. “We’ve worked so hard for this peace,” she said, wrapping one arm around his so that he couldn’t keep grabbing at his sword. “There is a measured response to this and an unmeasured one. I can’t insist that you opt for the former, but I beg you to understand what the latter will mean for our people.”

The visible tension in his body seemed to melt, and Corrin breathed a sigh of relief. No matter what mood he fell into from all the troublesome matters of rulership, his wife was at least adept at seeing to them. Ryoma drew himself up and adopted a more carefully thoughtful expression, less a cornered soldier and more a king. “Saizo, inform the Nohrian ambassador of all this—quietly. Study her reaction. See if any of this is a surprise to her.”

He stepped out of a dark corner. “It will be done, my king. And the dead boy’s family? Telling them the truth would have half the nobility baying for blood, but I know how lying would offend Your Majesty’s honor.”

“Omission would not be deception,” Kagero said. “Protecting Hoshido from another war is more important than being completely forthright over two lives. They can be told the truth—he was found dead. People die on the road, it’s an unfortunate risk of traveling. We can tell them we found the killer and recovered everything he stole. Some gold as compensation wouldn’t seem awry, either.”

It all seemed rather duplicitous to Corrin, but she was glad that it wasn’t her making the hard decisions. Ryoma nodded slowly at her suggestion, obviously uncomfortable but unable to offer a better alternative. “See it done.”

The two ninja left silently to see to their tasks, almost knocking over Kaze and Silas listening at the door. No longer in a haze of anger, Ryoma went to Yukimura and clapped him on the shoulders. “Thank you, my friend. I shudder to think what might have happened if you weren’t there.”

“Your Majesty does me too much honor. Any other servant of the throne would have done the same.”

“But it was you,” Ryoma said, then looked down to the spot Yukimura was still holding. “Rest. Take as long as you need, that’s an order.”

His neck and face reddened. “As my king commands.”

Ryoma finally let him go and knelt in front of Corrin. She took a long breath to try and hide the way her hands were shaking. They refused to fall still, and she stuffed them under her legs instead. “And you, Sister…I don’t have the words to tell you how sorry I am. This never should have happened. I’ll do everything in my power to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

“You could always end this business of suitors, Brother,” Corrin said. He frowned, and she knew that wasn’t going to happen. No matter how guilty he felt, obligation was obligation. “Or allow me some respite from it, at least.”

“I can do that. You don’t have to spend the night alone in here if you don’t want to, you can always come over to my apartments, or Sakura can—”

“Brother, I’m fine. Really,” Corrin lied. “Go on, I’m sure Shiro’s nursemaid could stand to be relieved.”

“True enough…all right, let me know if you need anything.”

He left her quarters, sparing Silas and Kaze outside any withering remarks as he strode away. Yukimura started to follow him, but only went as far as the door before sliding it shut and turning back to Corrin. She’d held herself together throughout the entire impromptu meeting, but the reality of it all was finally exceeding her ability to force it down. Corrin buried her face in her hands, trying to stay quiet enough that her retainers wouldn’t hear, but there was no masking it from someone already in her rooms. Without her noticing, Yukimura had stolen over to her bedside and knelt in front of her, hands resting on her knees. “Princess, please, dry your eyes,” he said softly. Corrin sniffled and looked at him through her fingers. Candlelight flickered in the lenses of his glasses, and his smile calmed some of her trembling. “You heard the king. It will take some careful maneuvering, but this should not threaten the peace you’ve built.”

“I know, but, but…” Corrin motioned to where his wound was, unwilling to risk worsening it, and bit back another sob as her heart began to race again. “You were hurt because of me. You could have died because of me. I don’t know how I could live with myself if that happened.”

“Shh, shh.” Yukimura took a silk square from within his kimono and wiped some of her tears. Corrin focused on his face, on the little bit of stubble that had come in on his chin during the day, and steadied her breathing. He tucked his square away and clasped one of her hands between his. “Nohr already stole you away once. My life is not so great a thing that I would not give it up to keep that from happening again.”

“Don’t say that. Don’t, please.”

That thought, she knew, would overpower whatever control her dragonstone might offer. Yukimura sat next to her so that she was on his uninjured side, then let Corrin lean into him. He was warm, easy to rest against and let his presence soothe her. “As my lady wishes.”

She knew he would stay there as long as she wanted without complaint, and a not-insignificant part of her intended to keep him detained there for a while yet, but all her nerves crashing down at once were letting exhaustion creep in. Corrin gripped at his clothes. “Would you humor another wish of mine?”

“It would be my honor.”

“Would you…would you stay in here with me tonight?” she asked, her cheeks burning as the words passed her lips. Yukimura didn’t respond right away, and Corrin was too embarrassed to look up and search his face for an answer, burying into his shoulder instead. “You don’t have to, I’d just feel safer if you were here, but I know you need to recuperate, so I can ask Sakura—”

“I don’t mind staying, Lady Corrin.” He gently eased her away and stood up. “If it will put you at ease, then I don’t mind at all. The day’s been so tasking that I don’t know if I could make it to my quarters, truth be told. I just need to make up another futon.”

“You’re injured, you’ll do no such thing. Sit and I’ll make it.”

His eyes narrowed for an instant, but then he nodded once in acquiescence. Yukimura sat and watched instead as Corrin retrieved another futon and set of sheets from her closet, laying it out beside hers. As calming as having him around was, the heat on her back from his gaze was getting her blood pumping again, and Corrin took a bit longer than was really necessary when she had to get down on all fours and lean forward to arrange the sheets, letting her rear wave around a little in front of him. “I was going to make tea, would you like some?” she asked when she had to stand up again.

“I’d like that, thank you. But you really don’t have to go to all this trouble on my account, Lady Corrin.”

She did, she really did, if there was any hope of assuaging the guilt gnawing at her every time she looked over and saw him touching at the space around his wound. “Did Sakura not finish with your healing?” Corrin asked as she set out the tea leaves on her table. “Do I have to carry you back down there?”

“No, your sister was quite thorough, there’s no need for any carrying. You know how magical healing is. Even when the injury is gone, the body can’t keep up and still clings to the pain. There’s some liniment on it now, but it will be twinging for a while yet.”

Corrin nodded as she heated her teapot in her hand. Somehow it made her feel even more helpless, condemning him to sourceless pain while his body struggled to adjust to the speed of magic, and the surface of the teapot grew hotter in her palm. Yukimura didn’t seem to realize what she was doing at first, not until steam began rising from the spout, and then all he could do was look on in keen interest until she took her hand from the bottom. “It’s faster than a brazier,” she said, a little sheepishly, as she started to pour the water.

“Clearly…Your Highness is a woman of many talents. Regulating combat magic that well is no mean feat.”

“You flatter me. Do it more.”

He laughed under his breath and let Corrin press a teacup into his hands. She sat opposite him on the side of her bed so they were facing one another, where she could look greedily at him over the rim of her own cup under the pretense of blowing on the tea. “I’m sure I could go on for quite some time, princess, but the tea would be cold by the time I finished, and I would hate to waste your efforts.”

For all the glances she’d stolen at him in meetings or in one corridor or another, Yukimura seemed very different now. He was relaxed, at ease, not drawn tight over his obligations to the throne. Corrin remembered the closing days of the war, when he had arrived from the capital to lend support, how he had been much the same way when he was repairing their mechanisms or building new ones, falling happily into his preferred hobby. The casual way he was sitting on the futon was a far cry from the rigid stance he adopted around the king, and there was more lightness around his eyes as he took a testing sip, usually so sharp with focus. He smiled. “Delicious.”

Something about his voice—the lower pitch, the fact that she was his audience, maybe the word itself—rendered Corrin unable to respond right away. Transfixed as she was with his lips, the small spots of heat flashing in her lap were of little consequence. At least, until they seemed to be the source of the panic on Yukimura’s face. “Lady Corrin, your tea!”

His free hand shot out to grab her cup, which she vaguely realized was tilted enough to spill the near-boiling tea into her lap. Yukimura hissed under his breath as it rolled toward his fingers instead, but kept his hold until it was safely over the nightstand where he could set it down. Corrin’s stomach tightened as he rubbed his thumb. “Hmm, I think that needs some attention to keep it from staining—”

“Stop it!”

He froze for a moment at the harshness of her tone, then arched one eyebrow. “Your Highness?”

“Gods, Yukimura, stop getting yourself hurt on my account!” Corrin said, making a fist and punching her futon to drive her point across. The heat from the spilled tea in her lap stifled under the burn in her eyes. “Must I order you to stop putting yourself in harm’s way for me? How can I bear to keep seeing you do this to yourself?”

Yukimura held up his hand, which was as unmarked as the other. Of course. He was trained as a ninja, he was certainly fast enough to keep from injuring himself. Corrin stained her sleeves drying her eyes, half to clean herself up and half to hide her face. Had she really just said that? Corrin wracked her brain for a spell that might allow her to melt into the floor before the embarrassment could kill her. “Lady Corrin…you’re free to order me as you wish. But that is one I may not be able to obey.”

“Then I’ll have Ryoma order you.”

“You may not find the king so yielding on this matter, either,” he said softly. Corrin worried her lip between her teeth. “In any case, I’m not a fragile bit of jade, it takes more to make me crack. But this is no fine matter to settle you in for bed. What do you normally do?”

“Normally?” She shifted from side to side. There was always the option of lying, but Corrin was almost certain he would see through that. “Well, most nights I’ll either read or, ah…look at your picture box,” she mumbled.

He made a slight, vaguely contented sound. “I’m glad it can be such a comfort to you. Shall I step out for a moment so you can change?”

Yukimura was on his feet and moving to her bath before Corrin could respond, sliding the door shut to wait for her. She tried another sip of her tea, then went to her wardrobe for some nightclothes. A laugh rose up in her at the thought of insisting that she simply never wore clothes to bed, but eventually she settled on a light set. Once she’d laid out her kimono and sprinkled on some lifting powder to draw out the stain in the lap, Corrin knocked lightly on the door to the bath. “Ah, I’m done, you can come out now.”

It was a mystery to her where he had been hiding it and would likely remain so, but Yukimura had already changed into a simple green jinbei just a shade darker than his now-loose hair, while his day clothes were neatly folded and tucked under his arm. The tie keeping the two halves of the top together was fastened only loosely, leaving a split at the top that afforded Corrin the merest hint of some hair in the middle of his chest. “Soft…”

“Beg pardon, Lady Corrin?”

“Er—I said that material looks soft,” she lied, and snatched his clothes away to hang them up and air everything out. The pleasant shiver working through her just as easily could have come from the open window, but Corrin chose to believe it was from Yukimura’s gaze sweeping over her back. She slid the outer door shut and bumped her forehead against the frame as she latched it. Sleep seemed exceedingly unlikely tonight, even more than usual. Corrin quickly washed her face and then crawled back into bed. “There we go. Do you mind if I make a bit of light to look at the pictures?”

Yukimura knelt down beside his futon and folded the sheets back so he could settle in. At first he tried to lay on his back, but his look of discomfort was obvious, forcing him to lay on his right, facing her bed, to keep from aggravating the pain in his side. He slipped off his glasses and placed them on the nightstand, next to the tea he hadn’t had a chance to enjoy. “Feel free, I learned a long time ago how to sleep anywhere.”

Corrin wondered if Kaze could provide her with enough ninja training to learn that particular skill. She looked over to make sure his eyes were closed, then retrieved her picture box and spun up a small pinprick of fire with her back to him. His assurances aside, there was no reason to leave something shining right in front of him.

The pictures moved through their familiar sequence, roughly chronological as best she could tell, showing her with the parents she never had a chance to know. The smile spreading on her lips was tinged with bitterness at that thought. She was all that was left of these pictures. Her, and the artist.

She checked again to make sure there was no sliver of light falling on his face, but Yukimura was perfectly still, eyes closed, with his right arm nestled under his head for support. He was visible more in outline than detail, with only indirect light falling on him. It took Corrin a moment to confirm that he was still breathing, so subtle was the rise and fall of his chest. She rolled her tongue against her teeth. He was _right there_ , sleeping in her room, and there wasn’t a single thing she could do about it. The gods were so terribly cruel sometimes, letting her look as much as she wanted but never allowing any more. Corrin placed the picture box carefully back in its spot beside her bed, snuffed her light, and worked herself under the covers. _Sleep_ , she told herself. _Sleep_. But she knew all too well what was waiting for her, and the restlessness with which she would inevitably start the morning. All the same, she had to try, and was closing her eyes when there was the subtle shift of fabric behind her.

“Good night, Lady Corrin,” Yukimura said softly. “Sweet dreams to you.”

“There’s not the slightest chance of that…”

More fabric shifted, and one of the floorboards creaked with the changing spread of weight. He’d sat up, if she had to guess. “What do you mean?”

Corrin gripped at her pillow. Why couldn’t that have stayed in her head? “It’s nothing of consequence, forget that I said anything.”

“Forgive me, princess, but you’re not a very good liar,” Yukimura said. Corrin had a vague sense of him moving closer, to the edge of his futon. “If you’ve realized that my being here would trouble you too much to sleep, I’ll leave at once—”

“No!” Corrin flipped herself over in an instant so that she could see Yukimura’s silhouette in the faint moonlight filtering into her room. “No, it isn’t that. Your presence is a comfort. I simply…I don’t sleep well. I haven’t since the war ended.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Every night it’s one battlefield or another, always during the worst of the fighting.” She turned onto her back and stared at the darkened ceiling until she shut her eyes tight. Visions danced in front of her like some twisted theater, mocking her as her voice shuddered and broke. “I can hear it. The screams, the horses being cut down, metal screeching against metal. I wake up in the morning with the stench of blood in my nose. All the soldiers who died because of the decisions I made, their faces—”

She gasped at the sudden application of weight on her bedside, and her eyes shot open to see Yukimura sitting over her. For a moment, surprise forced all the things that plagued her in the night to the back of her mind. He gently stroked her hair as a burn worked through her body. “It’s all right, you’re safe now,” he said, carefully shifting her about so that her head was in his lap. All the while, he kept fussing with her hair, while his other hand sought out hers and clasped it. “I’ve heard of this. People who live through a terrible thing like a war, only to have it remain like a weight around their necks after it’s over. You’re a kind, sensitive soul, Lady Corrin. I shouldn’t be surprised that it affected you so. Or that you hid it for so long.”

Yukimura drew his hands away for a moment to let her change position, rolling onto her side to better support her neck, then swept down on her again. Corrin threaded their fingers together and held his hand under her chin. “There are things you can take, draughts that cause a dreamless sleep. I can visit the apothecary for you in the morning.”

“I don’t feel like I deserve to forget,” Corrin said. It felt wrong to relish in the way he was touching her while trying to offer comfort, to add some lascivious dimension to his gesture, but there was no helping herself. She swallowed her guilt down and gripped his hand tighter.

“You won the war for us, Lady Corrin. Hoshido and her people are safe thanks to you. There’s no one more deserving of being able to live in peace.” Yukimura’s thumb traced across the back of her hand. “You shouldn’t have to keep fighting this war every night.”

Had she earned some measure of respite? _Could_ she, or did that wound run so deep that there was no healing it? She was in its grip so tightly that even the attempted assassination was no more than a minor distraction, fretting its hour in her mind before being pushed away. But…perhaps she didn’t have to be. There was no telling unless she tried. “Will you help me?” she asked.

“Of course, princess.”

Two of his fingers flitted over her ear as he stroked her hair, and Corrin had to stifle a moan. “I realize it’s hardly proper to ask, but…stay over here? Please? At least until I fall asleep.”

Yukimura drew his hands away, then gently moved her about so her head was resting on her pillow. Despite freeing himself up, he didn’t leave. Instead he worked into a more comfortable position, sitting up with his back resting on the wall and offering one hand for her to hold. Corrin turned on her side and latched onto it, trapping his whole arm against her chest. He started a little when she pushed up beside him, pressing her breasts to his forearm, but then didn’t move afterward. Her visions of the war persisted as sleep laid slowly over her, much like every night, though for the first time they felt more like memories than anything.

⁂

Corrin woke peacefully for the first time that she could recall, coming slowly out of sleep rather than jerking awake to catch her breath as if there were some invisible weight on her chest. She made to close her eyes again, only to find that she wasn’t at all tired. To the best of her recollection, she’d slept through the night without interruption, and whatever dreams had gone through her head were fading quickly with consciousness. Rather than the smell of blood, all she found was incense and the faint scent of ginger tea.

The rest of the night came rushing back. Corrin felt around on her bed, but Yukimura wasn’t there. A quick glance toward the other futon showed nothing, either—not even the futon itself. He must have packed it away already. Did he leave? Corrin dropped back down and growled into her pillow. It was probably for the best, there would be all sorts of awkward questions if Ryoma were to find him in here.

But he was off to recover, wasn’t he?

Corrin sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes so she could look around her bedroom. It was barely dawn, earlier than she usually started her day, but Yukimura was already awake, sipping a cup of tea at the table in the corner. Before she had a chance to say anything, he carried a tray with another teacup and bowls full of rice and miso to her bedside. Gods, there was no fairness to it, how he looked as handsome as he did so early in the morning before she could put a leash on her runaway thoughts. He was the picture of charming domesticity, wordlessly seeing to her needs before she even knew what they were. “Good morning, Lady Corrin,” he said. “How did you sleep?”

“Just fine…wonderfully, really.” She took a quick whiff of the tea before downing it all at once.

“I hope you’re not only saying that to spare my worry.”

Corrin shook her head, then stirred up her rice with the chopsticks on the tray. “I didn’t keep waking up and I’m not in a haze right now, so that’s going to be my starting point for wonderful. What time is it?”

“About five in the morning. I also took the liberty of drawing your bath, I’m sure it’s still warm.”

She raised an eyebrow as Yukimura returned to the table. He was still in his nightclothes, but he had taken down and folded everything Corrin had hung to air out the night before. “Felicia usually does that.”

“Ah, well, I’m sure that was her intent when she came in a short while ago, but…Miss Felicia suddenly seemed to have somewhere else she needed to be when she realized I was here,” Yukimura said, tugging at his collar. “Goodness, it’s hot this morning, isn’t it?”

Corrin wondered how soon she was going to hear about that from her maid. But, if she was going to believe it anyway, Corrin thought…she shivered and made a small sound of agreement before finishing the rest of her breakfast. She needed her stomach settled if she was going to try this. “You know, after all of that yesterday,” she said, careful to measure her words despite her heart threatening to beat right out of her chest, “I’ve decided—it’s no good not to take chances, when it can all be pulled away so quickly. Regret would eat at me worse than any defeat.”

Yukimura nodded sagely as Corrin took a fresh change of clothes from her wardrobe. “It’s a fine thing to live without regrets, princess.”

“Indeed.” She stopped at the door to her washroom and took a long breath. _If not now, when?_ Her resolve was ready to crumble, balanced on a knife’s edge. “That’s why, ah…gods, how do I do this…would you like to join me?”

All the blood in her body had surely rushed to her face with how hot it felt. Her first instinct was to bury her face in the clothes she was carrying, followed closely by running as fast as she could, but instead Corrin forced herself to turn toward him, willing her legs to obey when all they seemed to want to do was give out.

Yukimura seemed stunned to speechlessness, sitting there and barely holding on to his teacup while the color in his neck and face rose. With the way the blood was roaring in her ears, it was probably for the best that he wasn’t saying anything just yet. Corrin squirmed in place as he set his cup down, and the small _clack_ made her painfully aware of the silence left in its wake. “Lady Corrin, I apologize, I don’t think I heard you correctly—”

“Yes, you did.”

She had no idea where the nerve to get her voice back had come from, but she wasn’t going to question it. Corrin took another breath to steady herself. “I don’t want to hold this in any longer when you’re so willing to jump into harm’s way for me.”

“You’re still half in your nerves from yesterday, princess,” Yukimura said. He started to stand, but stopped when Corrin hurried to his side and sat down, pale violet eyes sweeping over her, studying, wondering.

“The only difference is that I’m giving voice to my feelings, they haven’t changed for the last three years. Please, just let me say my piece, and then we’ll never speak of this again if that’s what you want.”

There was no change in his expression for a moment, until the edges of his lips began to form a smile. “All right, princess. Go ahead. Say all that you like, I won’t interrupt.”

“Thank you.” Her mouth felt so dry, suddenly. She pushed through the discomfort while piecing her thoughts together. “You asked me yesterday why I was rejecting every suitor out of hand, and I said something about them being too young, do you remember? The truth is, there’s only one reason, and that’s because none of them were you. None of them…ask after a book I was reading days after I mention it a single time, or get the most adorable look while working on a new automaton like you do. None of them sneak me sweets when meetings run long, or find new teas for me to sample from halfway across the kingdom, or stay up with me half the night to make sure I can sleep soundly. It might have taken a great big thing like yesterday when you saved me to make me say it, but it was all the little things, every day, that made me fall in love with you.”

After one moment of silence passed between them, then another, Yukimura opened his mouth to speak, but Corrin found she had more to say. “I’m sure you’re going to explain to me all the reasons why what I just said was foolish, and that I don’t _really_ think that, but…this isn’t a passing infatuation, or the kind of affection you might feel for a caretaker. When I say that I’ve fallen in love with you, I mean it in the way that a woman loves a man, with everything that entails. The way you smile, the kind look behind your glasses, how you stand half a head over me and are so handsome besides, it all stirs things in me. And honestly, I have no reservations about sabotaging my brother’s attempts to get me to marry if it isn’t to you,” Corrin said, then realized she was breathing far too fast. When it was back under control, she closed her eyes. “There. I’ve said everything I want to say.”

Once again, it seemed as if she had robbed him of any response at first. The way he bowed his head put the rims of his glasses over his eyes, making it impossible for her to try and divine his thoughts. Just before the silence became interminable, Yukimura took her hand in his and pressed a light kiss to the backs of her fingers, then set her palm against his cheek. There was the slightest hint of stubble on his skin, and she had to resist the urge to feel all of it. “Oh, Lady Corrin…I didn’t know all those glances you were stealing had such a wealth of feelings behind them.”

She was only barely able to stifle her surprised yelp at being so thoroughly found out, then pouted as she stared sidelong at the table. “Right. Ninja training.”

“I’m barely nobility at all, princess. I like to think that my house—such that it is—has more than proven its loyalty to the throne, so there’s no alliance to bolster.” His gaze drifted down from her eyes to her lips, and then lower, to the point where her nightshirt closed above her chest. “And at the risk of sounding crass, I’m old enough to be your father.”

A pleasant twinge rocked through her at that, making her stomach flutter before settling between her legs. Corrin rolled her thumb over Yukimura’s cheekbone, taking care not to jostle his glasses. “If you think that’s a quality that in some way detracts from my feelings for you, then you’re sorely mistaken.”

His eyes widened, and he seemed to move his head forward when Corrin took her hand back, seeking out her touch before catching himself and straightening up. “I…I see.” Yukimura chuckled under his breath. “When you said yesterday that your ideal suitor would be older than the ones you had seen, I have to admit that it was difficult to keep myself composed.”

Corrin thought she might bite right through her lip with the way she was rolling it between her teeth. “And why is that, Yukimura?”

“Because your interest isn’t as one-sided as you might think.”

Now it was her turn to lapse into silence, unable to summon up her words as he went on. “I am constantly at pains to deny to myself how terribly fond I am of you, Lady Corrin, over and above what would be proper for an advisor toward his princess. All the kindness you show in working with those still recovering from the war, the clever ideas you offer to the king during council meetings, and the delicate grace with which you conduct yourself…to say nothing of your obvious beauty. You’ve become such an excellent young woman.”

Yukimura reached for her hand in her lap, paused as if debating with himself, and then took it, pressing it between his own. He seemed to vacillate between hot and cold, but Corrin couldn’t focus on much of anything beyond what he was saying. “I was willing to push all of that down and simply be content in crossing paths with you while serving the throne, well out of my reach, until you said everything you did. And so here I am, on the other side of forty, having helped raise you when matters of state occupied your parents, trying to convince myself that the best thing is to let this matter drop. No matter how hopelessly I may love you, that seems like the only sensible thing to do.”

He turned her hand over so he could look at her palm and run his fingers along the sides. Some small part of Corrin’s mind knew he was right, that it would be better if they never spoke of this again. It was swiftly crushed under the part that saw her clambering into Yukimura’s lap. He started a little, grasping for something to say, but ultimately didn’t try to move her back. If anything, he shifted his legs a bit to make a more comfortable seat of his lap. “Lady Corrin—!”

“I think,” she said, laying her arms over Yukimura’s shoulders and letting one hand run up to the nape of his neck, “that we’ve more than earned the chance to do something that isn’t very sensible.”

Corrin canted her hips, and the rising stiffness pressed into her thigh forced a moan out of her. However red her face had to be, his was surely worse, with his blush racing all the way up to his eyes. Before she had a chance to study it any closer, Yukimura tilted his head and leaned toward her, as close as he could be to kissing her without doing so. A few wisps of his breath rolled across her lips, warm and so painfully, agonizingly close. His hand raced up the side of her leg and settled on the small of her back. “This is what you want?”

“Yes…gods, yes. I don’t care what anyone might say. Ryoma told me to pick someone, and I made my choice a long time ago.”

His hand tightened against her back without warning, pulling her body closer and all but flush with his. Corrin could feel the outline of his cock pressing on her, separated by only a few bits of thin fabric. How her heart hadn’t already beat right out of her chest was a mystery she had no mind to question now. The usual smooth tone of his voice vanished when he spoke, replaced by something lower, darker: “I’ve been told I can be a rather demanding lover.”

“Then demand,” Corrin said, “and I’ll accede.”

“Will you…”

His hand crept down, settling on her rear and squeezing hard. Corrin pushed back into his touch, bunching up the fabric of his jinbei between her fingers. Her throat was dry again, but she still managed to summon up something coherent. “I think you’ll find I can be quite accommodating.”

Yukimura chuckled, and a glint of something in his eye made her shiver. “That’s very good to know. May I kiss you now, princess? I have to confess that having you in my lap, looking at me the way you are and saying such things, is wearing my restraint unbearably thin.”

“Only if you use my name,” she said, squirming as he ran his hand along her rear and down to the sensitive skin at the top of one thigh. He was so close, enough that the stubble on his chin brushed against her. “No titles, no honorifics. Just my name.”

“As you wish…Corrin.”

His lips closed on hers, strong without being forceful, and she arched her torso into him, legs squeezing tight on his sides. The rush of heat through her whole body had nothing to do with the humid summer morning, she knew. All the pleasant dreams she had ever had of him paled against the real thing, against the head rush that made her feel as if she was floating, anchored to the world only by his hand on her. Corrin had to remind herself to breathe after the initial shock, and every rise and fall of her chest was faintly underscored with his scent, his perspiration and the smell of the powder he used to keep his strings from tangling. She wondered briefly if it was possible to get herself drunk on a scent.

The first press of his tongue against her lips made her start, but she yielded happily, and Yukimura dove in without any hesitation, taking all that she had to offer. Corrin pushed to deepen the kiss and paid him back in kind, gorging herself on his taste, overpowered by the ginger tea from before. All the while, his hand roamed across her back before returning to her rear, only for the feeling to double when he leaned forward and no longer had to support himself. Yukimura hiked her up slightly and brought her forward, shifting so that he could slide her along the outline of his cock and work a moan out of her.

When they broke for air, Corrin let her cheek drop into the crook of Yukimura’s shoulder, breathing deeply as her body shook and shuddered. She thought she knew how to make herself feel good, but this…it was as if a blindfold had slipped off, opening her eyes to countless new possibilities. “How was that?” Yukimura asked, laying kisses across her exposed cheek until his breath rolled over her ear and made her mewl.

“Ah…”

“Oh? That’s right, your ears are so very sensitive, aren’t they? Then I suppose I shouldn’t do something like this,” he said, and softly closed his lips and teeth over the ridge.

It was fortunate that he was already holding her up, ready to collapse from the attention as she was. Corrin whined and kissed at his neck, panting as he added the merest hint of his tongue to the mix. In all the time since first mentioning how delicate her ears were, she had never anticipated the information being used against her like this. Nothing in her thought to complain about it, though. The low drag of wet heat across her skin may as well have been fire, burning her up and sparking some ember deep in her core, roused from dormancy and desperate to make up for three years of denial. “Yukimura…”

“Ah.” He moved his mouth away, though only just, leaving his cheek against her temple so his words could hum through her head without the need to raise his voice above a whisper. “I realized that I never answered your question.”

“Hmm?” Corrin rocked her hips against him and squeezed tighter. Question? What question? It couldn’t be all that important, not compared to the growing pressure between her legs.

“You asked me if I wanted to join you in the bath before all of these feelings came bubbling up, remember? I think I’ll take you up on that. Hold on, Corrin.”

The easy, casual way her name rolled off his tongue made her sigh as Yukimura tucked one hand under her and used the other to help get him to his feet. Corrin wrapped her legs around his waist, fully able to appreciate the pleasant firmness of his body now that he was using his muscles to hold her up, and looked at her bed over his shoulder. “Wouldn’t we need the bath _after_ …?”

“Don’t worry, I have every intention of making a very thorough mess of you,” Yukimura said, taking a few steps toward the bathroom. “You won’t have to wait long, either. But it’s so much better to work from a blank slate.”

“I’ll trust your experience in the matter, then.”

He stroked her hair with his free hand. “And I will see that your faith in me isn’t misplaced. Can you stand? I can’t very well wash you in your nightclothes.”

There was some shaking in her legs when he set her down, but Corrin stayed upright as his hands worked at the knot on her nightshirt, carefully parting the fabric and slipping it from her shoulders. The sharp breath rushing out of him was intensely satisfying, and Corrin couldn’t resist pushing her chest out a little to give him a better view. “So lovely,” Yukimura said, drawing his hands down her sides to her waistband. He relieved her of everything else in one swift motion and rested his head at her hips for a moment while he was still crouched down. A kiss into the short line of hair between her legs left her shivering as Yukimura stood and swept her up in his arms again. “So very lovely.”

Corrin watched with half-lidded eyes as her bedroom disappeared behind the sliding door, with the steam from the bath soaking into her skin and adding to the low throb coursing through her. She kissed his neck again. “I have a feeling you’ve thought about how you would do this before.”

“It’s crossed my mind once or twice. Ladies first, so let’s set you down here.”

Yukimura carefully put her on the washing stool and began ladling warm water into her wash bucket from the bath. “There we go, that ought to be plenty.” Corrin heard the soft shift of fabric, then looked over her shoulder in time to see him disrobing. Her first reflex was to demur and face forward, to offer him some privacy, but nothing in his expression said that he wanted her to look away. He undid the knot at his waist and took one arm out of his jinbei, then the other, letting it fall at his feet. The bandages around his middle could have been mistaken for a sarashi, and a pang of guilt worked through Corrin while she wondered if it hurt him to lift her up as he seemed to enjoy doing. There was no time to think about that, though, when he hooked his thumbs into the top of his trousers and eased them down, working slowly for his audience.

She couldn’t help gasping. His cock jutted out proudly from a patch of dark, curly hair, perhaps enough for a hand and a half. Her thoughts wandered down all manner of roads as he took a step toward her, especially when the washing stool put her exactly at eye level. Yukimura made a small satisfied sound and tucked some hair behind her ear. “Is something on your mind, Corrin?”

Before there was any real thought to do so, Corrin was bringing her hand up along the inside of his leg, flooded with curiosity about what it might feel like. Yukimura intercepted her hand, though, and gently took it away. “All in good time,” he said, and took a few supplies from the shelf nearby. “Face forward, please.”

Corrin pouted, but did so all the same. Judging from the sound, he was kneeling behind her, then gathering up her hair in bunches to pin it atop her head. “You were right, you can be a little demanding,” she said playfully.

“Oh, you have no idea…there. I wouldn’t want to have to leave you waiting while your hair dried.” Yukimura ran his hands over her bare back, picking out all the ridges of her spine until they rose to the nape of her neck. His fingers slowly closed forward until they were resting over her throat, stroking softly. “I must ask that you accede to one demand in particular, though.”

“Yes?”

“If you want to stop at any point, tell me, and we’ll stop immediately,” Yukimura said, then kissed her nape when he took his hands back. “Much as I appreciate your willingness, please don’t try to bear something you find unpleasant for my sake. This is the only thing I have to insist on. Do you understand?”

She nodded once, and Yukimura laid another kiss on her back, lower, along the central ridge. “I need to hear you say it, Corrin.”

“Yes,” she said, shifting her legs against one another. It had escaped her notice until now, but her thighs were a sticky mess, made worse with each throb of her core. “Yes, I understand.”

“Wonderful. Now let’s get you cleaned up.”

Rather than another kiss, warm water hit her neck, flowing down her back and chest and shoulders. It was a pleasant heat rather than the summer’s stifling humidity, and Corrin relaxed into the feeling. If he meant to pamper her, she was hardly going to try and stop him. Yukimura took one of the cloths from the shelf and worked the water all over her back first, wiping away all the sweat and detritus left over from the day before. His free hand spread the water down her arms and legs, sliding so close along her thighs that her stomach tied into a knot when he moved away. “You’re an awful tease,” Corrin said, rocking her hips until he stilled her with a hand on her stomach.

“Patience is a virtue. Lift your arm up.”

She did so, and he ran the cloth the length of her arm, from her shoulder to the tips of her fingers, then did the same with the other arm. Finally Yukimura brought it up to her collarbones, working over the ridge before going lower, between her breasts and then quickly up over them. Corrin whined into the motion, pushing her chest toward his hand, and a satisfied little sound answered her, followed by a kiss to the crook of her neck. “Not to worry, we’re almost done,” Yukimura said softly. One hand raced up while the other drifted down with the cloth, thumb stroking along her lips until she kissed it. “So obedient, so sweet…ah, there’s plenty to clean here, I see.”

“I have to, _mmhh_ —” Corrin’s voice tightened to another whine as he let the cloth slide between her legs, gentle and teasing— “I have to blame you for that…”

“Then I’ll have to take responsibility, won’t I?”

Yukimura continued down her legs, making small circles until he was satisfied with her thighs and calves. The kisses in the crook of her neck went upward, landing on her ears and making her whole body shake. He set the cloth down and pressed his hand onto her thigh, high enough to make her gasp. “I realize this might only make a bigger mess, but you seem so tense,” Yukimura said, and settled two fingers over her clit.

Corrin’s hips nearly bucked into his hand, overwhelmed by the flood of pleasure shooting up through her, and choked on her words until she was utterly incoherent. Yukimura growled against her skin, making the delicate structure of her ear hum with the motion. Her heart raced, beating so fast that everything burned, with all the heat flaring from between her legs.

He was far from done, though. Yukimura moved his fingers in a slow swirl, circling close to her clit without giving her what she wanted until she was least expecting it. All of her thoughts went blank when he drew close, her world narrowing down to him, the pressure of his chest on her back, his lips on her ear, his fingers working her over. It all grew too much to handle, and a sob cracked out of her chest when he continued to deny her. The coil in her was wound so _tight_ , pressing in from all sides until she could barely breathe as the tears rolled down her face. Anything would do her in now, the slightest touch in the right place, the lightest application of pressure…

His finger slipped inside of her, and the dam burst into a thousand pieces. Every muscle going slack at once left Corrin almost tipping over, unable to stop herself as every nerve in her body sang and thrummed. Yukimura held her up as she shook, keeping her tight against him as she rode it out. She was floating again, lost to the world, above any earthly concerns or cares beyond memorizing everything she was feeling. Doing it herself didn’t compare to this, she had never been ready to tip over after using her own hands. The sound of her own breathing slowly interceded on the haze she had fallen into, and it was a terrible effort to sharpen the sounds into something sensible. “Yukimura…”

“It’s all right, I’m here. I’m right here.”

He carefully drew his hand away and wrapped his arm around her waist, still holding her through the aftershock the shift brought on. The blaze in her had been sated for the moment, but there was no snuffing it anymore, not now that she knew how hot it could burn. Corrin weakly wound their fingers together and rubbed the back of his hand on her cheek, holding it tight against her. “Good.”

She kept drifting for a few minutes more, taking her time in coming back down to reality. It wasn’t easy, not when his idle kisses along the ridge of her ear drew out shivers and mewls. “I don’t mean to pry, but was that your first…?” Yukimura asked.

“Yes,” she mumbled. “Or, the first from someone else.”

His grip around her waist tightened. “I do hope I was able to compare to your own expertise.”

“And then some,” Corrin said, turning her head so she could kiss him. Despite starting it, she quickly surrendered control to him, letting Yukimura cup her cheek to hold her still. When he did relent, he took a fresh cloth and dried her off, patting away all the lingering water that hadn’t yet dripped from her body. “So, shall I do the same for you?”

Yukimura smiled as he finished drying her arms. “I’d like that, Corrin. But I may have to heat the water again, the fire seems to have gone out.”

One fire, at least. Corrin put one hand into the half-full bucket of water, summoned up a weak branch of her magic, and heated the water until a little steam rose from the surface. “Or you can do that,” Yukimura said, and stood to work out some soreness in his legs. Corrin licked her lips while they switched places. He fixed his hair to keep most of it from getting wet and began unwinding the bandage around his abdomen. When it was loose enough to fall away, he lowered his head so she could work, but Corrin paused with the bucket at her side, studying the planes of his back. “Is something wrong?”

“It’s just…you’re _real_ , you’re here with me. This isn’t a dream, I can actually touch you.”

“Whenever you’d like.”

Corrin rested her hand over the traces of his wound from the day before, a thin white scar below his ribs, and the muscles there stiffened. “Should I be careful here?”

“It’s not as bad as it was yesterday. The bandages are more for pressure than anything,” Yukimura said, and relaxed under her touch. “I would ask that you not be especially rough, but it shouldn’t be an issue.”

“All right.” Corrin picked up the bucket and carefully tipped it over him, delighting in finally seeing a shiver of his own as the water coursed over his skin, forming into tiny beads all over his back. Before she picked up the cloth, she ran her hands over his shoulders, his arms, the bumps and dips of his spine. There were some old scars, lines that had once cut across muscle and spilled blood, but they were old and long since healed. Corrin kissed the flat expanse of one shoulder blade. “You’re so handsome.”

Some color rose on his neck. “I—you’re kind to say so.”

Corrin straightened herself up and maneuvered closer as best she could on her knees, cloth in hand. She moved in small circles, bringing up the skin that was ready to fall along with his sweat and whatever bits of fabric were clinging from his jinbei, and she grinned at Yukimura’s contented sigh. It was her turn to be in charge now, at least for a little while, even if the prospect of letting him guide her through everything else was all kinds of appealing. “How’s the pressure?” Corrin asked.

“Perfect.”

She went through the same process that he had with her, dotting his back and neck with kisses while she cleaned his arms, chest, and legs. When she was creeping down his stomach, Corrin’s breath grew short, and her free hand moved ahead of the cloth into the line of hair extending from his navel. “I don’t…I’ve never done this before, so tell me what feels good, won’t you?”

“Of course.” Yukimura put his hand over hers and brought it the rest of the way. Corrin gasped softly when her fingers closed around his shaft. It was warm, much warmer than the rest of him, firm as muscle, and twitching slightly under her touch. She slid her hand down into the hair at the base, then went back up to the tip. A low sound rumbled out of Yukimura’s chest, and his words were suddenly tighter, more strained. “You can grip like that and ease back a bit. No need for scrubbing, just a few pats is fine.”

She did as he instructed, watching carefully to commit the process to memory, then brought the cloth lower. Yukimura moaned and hissed through his teeth. “What about here?” Corrin asked with a smirk, cupping him lightly.

“Don’t tempt me, Corrin…I think you deserve a better first time than me taking you on your bathroom floor.”

Despite supposedly being in control, her stomach flipped at his words. That was what she wanted, she knew that much, but to have it spelled out that they were going in that direction turned the tables right back on her. It did nothing to help her patience, either. Corrin continued with the cloth until he had been thoroughly wiped down, then scrambled to find a dry cloth and finish the job. “All set?”

“I only need to put on some new bandages.”

Corrin replaced the wash bucket and hung the cloths to dry, then let her hair out so it could tumble down her back. When she was done shaking it out, she watched Yukimura redo his bandages, sitting on the edge of the bath proper, looking down to wind it properly around his stomach. “That should do it,” he said, tucking the end under the outermost layer. Corrin put her hands behind her back and looked innocently at him when he stood up and approached her. Yukimura kissed the crown of her head. “Would you like to continue?”

“I’d like nothing more.”

“Your enthusiasm is truly delightful,” Yukimura said, and picked her up again. Without their clothes, there was nothing in between them, nothing to get in the way of his cock pressing against her. Corrin’s lips parted wordlessly as he carried her back to the bedroom. Clouds had rolled in, undercutting the dawn and leaving the whole space somewhat dim. “I have to confess that it’s been some time since I’ve done this…I do hope you’ll forgive any missteps on my part.”

As if she had any basis for comparison. “How long?”

Yukimura laid her on her bed and followed her down, spreading out and propping himself up on his hands as he leaned back. “Not since before the war. Though I’m not so out of practice that I’ve forgotten anything,” he said, and brought one hand up to beckon her forward. “Come here, Corrin.”

She crawled obediently toward him, planting her legs between his and leaning forward. Yukimura stroked her cheek before his thumb dragged down to her lips again. Corrin kissed it once more, and his grin grew to show a slight hint of teeth. “I didn’t know how much I would love seeing that lurid look on your face…and now I’m cursing myself for not taking some strings from my rooms.”

“You want to tie me down?”

“In more ways than one. Is that something you think you might like to try?”

The thought of having his strings woven over her arms and legs, bound tight and helpless while he did as he wished to her, sent a spike of arousal shuddering through her. She was going to make a mess of her thighs again at this rate. “I think I could be convinced.”

“Something to keep in mind for another day, then. But not right now. Now…I just want to focus on making you feel good,” Yukimura said. He sat up and fastened his hands on her hips to set Corrin face-up on the bed. Suddenly he was on top of her, kissing her fiercely, possessively, until he broke away to trail his lips down the soft lines of her throat. Corrin arched her back toward him when he went further down, lips closing around one stiff nipple while he rolled its twin between his thumb and first finger. A broken little moan almost slipped out of her, stopped by the hand she clapped over her mouth at the last second. Yukimura looked at her over the rim of his glasses, eyes cool and dark in the overcast morning, and drew his tongue back from flitting over her. “Please, don’t stifle yourself. I want to hear your voice. Would you hand me that pillow, please?”

He held onto it as he continued trailing kisses down her body, until he brushed at the line of hair between her legs. Yukimura sat up for a moment and slipped his free hand under her rear, lifting her enough to slide the pillow underneath. With the new angle, Corrin could see all too easily the line he was tracing along the inside of her thigh, kisses melting into gentle bites with the merest application of his teeth. The shot of sensation with each touch, each light brush of his stubble, worked another little sound out of her, too incoherent for her to even put a name to them. Her back was arched as high as it would go, drawing her body tense once more. “Yukimura, please…”

There was no rushing him, though. His hands closed around her legs to keep them spread, and each time he would circle back around to her sex, he would leave nothing but his warm breath rolling over her as he moved to the other leg. Corrin resisted in the only way she could, biting down on her fingers to deny him the moans and gasps he eked out of her. Yukimura looked up at her, releasing the bit of skin he had trapped in a gentle bite. He was so _close_ , close enough that she could have pushed him down if she let go of the sheets she was clawing at, letting a smile grow when he had utterly no right to one.

“So quiet, princess,” Yukimura said, releasing his hold on one thigh to trace a line along the back with his finger. A spike of arousal shot through her when he rested it on her sex, firmly enough to dirty the pillow underneath her. It slipped inside her with a hair more pressure, and the upward curl against her was enough to make her whine. “That’s better.”

His lips closed around her clit, and Corrin thought she might die then and there. The heat, the pressure, the faint feeling of suction—any thoughts left in her head burned away and escaped as a desperate, broken cry. Corrin’s hands raced into Yukimura’s hair, intent on keeping him in place even if it killed her. Thankfully, he seemed to have no mind to leave now. His tongue moved in a slow circuit, indulging her, keeping her on the edges of bliss while he slipped another finger into her. Despite squeezing down on him, there was almost no resistance, a fact she was glad of when the second finger curled forward like the first. Whatever he was hitting upon, it was something she had never been able to find on her own, and each motion sent lightning through her body. Tears massed at the corners of her eyes as her fingers tightened in his hair. All the pressure in her body pooled and bubbled in her core, so intense that she couldn’t adjust but not enough to put her over the edge. He was holding her there, balanced on a knife’s edge, completely at his mercy.

The slow, almost languorous rhythm Yukimura had adopted suddenly blazed to life, throwing her body into chaos. Where his tongue had been skirting her clit, only making enough contact to keep her simmering, now it lashed. Corrin writhed under his attentions, one leg kicking wildly into empty air until the arch in her back fell out and every nerve in her body lit up for a second time.

It had less of the novelty as the first, but all of the intensity. Corrin choked out a sob as she broke through the haze in her mind, as the power of it overwhelmed her. The satisfied sound Yukimura made hummed against her, making her tremble while he slipped his fingers away and drew back. She released his hair from her grip, allowing him to sit up and pull her into his lap where he could hold her close. Corrin laid her cheek on his shoulder and let him squeeze her tight through the aftershocks, the blank space in her mind gradually filling back up with one insistent thought that demanded to be given voice. “I love you,” she whispered, watching some of the clouds clear to lighten up her rooms.

Yukimura shivered and lightly kissed the soft space beneath her ear. “I love you too, Corrin.”

She wasn’t sure she ever wanted to move from his lap, enjoying the feeling of him holding her there while a sunbeam struck her side and left a pleasant warmth on her skin. It was only a stiff press against her thigh that finally spurred her to motion, holding on to Yukimura’s shoulders for support as she leaned back so she could look at him. He had managed to discreetly dry his mouth while she luxuriated, leaving only a few traces of wetness around his lips. “Well…it’s your turn, isn’t it?” she asked.

His hand stroked across her back. “You seem a bit worn out. We don’t have to do everything right now, you know. It’s perfectly fine if you want to rest.”

“Oh, I’m going to take a wonderful nap after all of this, I promise you that. But not right now,” Corrin said, rocking her hips to move back and forth against him. Yukimura moaned. “Now I just want to focus on making you feel good.”

She grinned at turning his words back on him, then shuffled off his lap to lay back on the bed, keeping the pillow in place under her. One finger beckoning him was all it took. All at once he was over her again, supporting himself with his elbows on either side of her while his cock dragged along the length of her sex. Corrin mewled and kissed him, reaching down his chest and stomach until her hand closed around his shaft. A few quick strokes made his hips roll forward, and she guided him into place through a quick, needful kiss. “Ready?” he asked, almost shaking with the effort of restraining himself.

“Very.”

His first slow press into her was a flash of sensation, an overpowering blaze of fullness that made her go limp for a moment before she actively relaxed and let him in. Yukimura sank deeper into her, going slowly until he was buried up to the hilt and they were as close as they could possibly be. Corrin moaned through another kiss, marveling at how well they melded together. There were stars twinkling in her eyes when they broke for air. “How do you feel?” Yukimura asked, his voice soft against her ear. “Can I start moving?”

Corrin wrapped her arms and legs around his body. “Yes…feels so good…”

He didn’t mean to wait if he didn’t have to. Yukimura drew back, leaving a yearning emptiness in his wake, before rocking forward and filling it up again. Corrin’s nails raked across his back, and the scratches only seemed to spur him on and make his rhythm accelerate. One of his hands slipped under her hair and cradled her head, keeping her close as their tempo rose and fell. Each roll of his hips hit several spots that sent fractures racing through her composure, winding her tight again like one of his mechanisms.

“Ah, there’s the obvious risk of all this,” Yukimura said, gritting his teeth as he forced himself to slow down and be sensible. “It would be better if I didn’t—”

She tightened her legs around his waist and pulled him in. He stopped altogether in surprise, then trembled. “Corrin?”

“Do it,” she said, and her stomach flipped at the realization of what she was asking for. The pressure seemed to wind twice as tight in an instant. Corrin gazed up at his wide violet eyes and smiled, adrift in a fresh wave of desire. “Please, do it. I want this.”

Yukimura choked on some kind of reply, then fell against her with a powerful snap of his hips. She cried out in ecstasy at the weight of him on her combined with the force of his thrusts, completely encompassing her until there was nothing in her world outside of her bed. “Gods, Corrin, you can’t—you can’t say that and not expect me to lose my mind!” Yukimura gasped out, rising to a feverish pitch. He pulled her into a crushing, bruising kiss as every muscle in his body grew impossibly tight against her.

The rush of warmth spilling into her combined with the angle of his thrusts sent Corrin spiraling off again, her climax wracking through her until she was a twitching, trembling mess. Her nails were still dug halfway into Yukimura’s back as he fell still, burying his face against her shoulder while his heavy, frantic breaths grew calm.

Neither of them moved at first. It was too satisfying, too pleasant, to dream of trying to do anything else for the moment. Corrin did relax her hands to stroke his back rather than claw at it, then slowly unlinked her legs from around his waist when the awkward position started to make them cramp. Yukimura shifted just enough to kiss the side of her throat, then eased his hips back and slipped out of her. The loss gnawed at her body for a moment before readjusting, and Corrin turned on her side to face him when he collapsed on the futon. He absently reached out and brushed her cheek with his thumb while a bead of sweat rolled down his neck. “I do hope I didn’t cause you any…discomfort at the end there,” Yukimura said softly.

Corrin shook her head. “This seems like it’s going to be the good kind of soreness.”

She shuffled closer so he could hold her as she nuzzled into the patch of hair on his chest. Yukimura gave her back a few gentle pats while their legs tangled together. “This is going to be awkward to explain to your brother.”

“Maybe a little.” Corrin kissed his chest, then leaned back enough that she could look at him. “But we’ll deal with it together.”

“Of course.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you very much for reading. If you enjoyed this, you may also like my other Corrin/Yukimura fic, [A Total Disaster of a Fake Date](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18445298).
> 
> Art courtesy of [AATKAW](https://aatkaw.newgrounds.com/).


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